Visiting 'Haver til Maver' to learn about school gardens as places for learning

DFE and our local partner Wildlife Conservation Nepal spent a week with Haver til Maver to learn about the school garden concept and how it can further hands-on learning as part of our Interactive Environmental Education program.

The excitement was all around us as a lively throng of fifth graders got instructions to harvest from their vegetable plots at Haver til Maver. Haver til Maver promotes school gardens across Denmark and has their own school garden plots at Krogerup Avlsgård, the headquarters of Årstiderne, a company that distributes organic meal boxes to households. Here, nearby schools come to learn about growing vegetables, preparing and eating them. Through this they learn about soil, compost, sustainability, where their food comes from, and much more.

The excitement reached a new level when the students were to use the harvested vegetables to make chill sin carne (instead of ground beef, they used veggies). The children got busily to work, splitting into groups, making fires, washing and chopping vegetables, reading the recipe instructions and preparing the spices. At the end of it, they got to eat their various meal creations. They spent the morning fully engaged and not even noticing the learning taking place. Through the school garden, the students get to use their language and math skills, they learn how to cooperate and follow instructions, and they get concrete life skills. And they find out that vegetables are delicious.

Danish Forestry Extension (DFE) and our partner Wildlife Conservation Nepal (WCN), who was visiting for a week in early September, got to observe the activities and see how Haver til Maver works in practice. The visit also included visits to other local school gardens around Copenhagen as well as workshops. DFE and WCN have partnered with Haver til Maver to develop and take the school garden concept to Nepal. We got a ton of inspiration and look forward to starting school gardens at selected schools in Kathmandu. This initiative is part of our ongoing Interactive Environmental Education program that we have been implementing in Nepal for the past 10 years.